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The House of Dies Drear Introduction

In A Nutshell

The House of Dies Drear is a young adult novel by American author Virginia Hamilton. Dies Drear was first published 1968, and is a ghost story (maybe!) and a mystery (definitely!), told mostly from the point of view of Thomas Small, a thirteen-year-old boy. It's set in an isolated, old house full of secret passageways and hidden tunnels. The house used to be a 'station' on the Underground Railroad, the name given to a network of people dedicated to helping American slaves escape from their masters and reach freedom in the pre-Civil War era.

Storytelling was a big part of Hamilton's life growing up, as she said in an interview, "My mother said that her father sat his ten children down every year and said, 'I'm going to tell you how I escaped from slavery, so slavery will never happen to you'" (source). She was drawn to writing stories for children and young adults because she had "such clear memories about being a kid" (source). Sounds like a good reason to us!

If you want to learn more about Thomas and his family after reading The House of Dies Drear, be sure and pick up a copy of The Mystery of Drear House, the second and final volume of The Dies Drear Chronicles.

Why Should I Care?

“I think that the past, the past is behind us (‘be real confusing if not, but anyway…)”

Yes, friends, 90s jam rockers Blues Traveler are right—and not just about how cool you can look if you wear a bunch of harmonicas around your neck. No, what we agree with is the idea that we tend to the think of the past as…well, passed. In other words, we tend to look ahead to the future without too much thought for all the stuff that happened to get us into the present.

But isn’t there value in recognizing even the ugliest parts of our past, in the hope that we never repeat the same mistakes?

Virginia Hamilton would answer with a resounding yes. The House of Dies Drear takes us all the way back to the Civil War. We learn about the history of the Underground Railroad, an effort to save former slaves from the worst sorts of persecution. More than a hundred years later, the evidence of the Railroad lives on. Hamilton shows us how the legacy of history continues to shape our present behavior. It’s like we’re all living in a very old house, like the one in the novel, with all kinds of fascinating passageways and compartments that shouldn’t be forgotten.

Hamilton's novel is more than just a dusty old history lesson, though. It’s a mystery, wrapped in a riddle, deep-fried and served up in a crispy enigma shell. Yum. Like all good authors, Hamilton serves up big ideas in a tasty package. She’ll get you to appreciate the importance of our shared past with a page-turning plot of treasure, ghosts, and creepy characters in masks that would satisfy even the most die-hard Scooby Doo fan. And she gets away with it, too. Thanks to a few meddling kids, of course.